A Fall of Princes

by Judith Tarr

  Mages held her. They were strong. She spat in Aranos’ face.

  He regarded her coolly, still smiling. “I chose,” he said, “long ago. My brother has served his purpose; he has begotten the child who will rule our twofold empires. You may keep him if it pleases you, though we must draw his claws. Excise his power; render him fit for service in the harem.”

  “Only if you suffer it first.”

  He was amused and slightly scandalized. “I shall have to keep you in lovers, I see. And keep you with child, until it tames you.”

  “You’ll kill me before you tame me.”

  “I will not. I require you alive and obedient. Have you no gratitude? My erstwhile allies would have slain you. I not only let you live; I grant you your beloved. I will cherish you, Sunlady, and raise your children as my own.”

  He was pleased with himself. He thought that he was generous. He expected her defiance; he did not let it trouble him. That a great war of magery roared and flamed without him, concerned him not at all.

  “Come,” he said, “be wise. Your father must fall, as you yourself have endeavored to make certain. Mine is dead already. My brother dies unless you accept the inevitable.”

  She stared at him, loathing that miniature mockery of Hirel’s face. “You did it for me,” she said.

  “I did it for a twofold throne. But also,” he conceded, “once I had seen you, for your own sake. I will not taint you with fleshly desire. I wish only to possess you. To feast, on occasion, on your beauty.”

  She lunged. Her captors were caught off guard. She fell upon Aranos.

  He was a serpent indeed, stronger by far than he looked, and fanged. Steel flashed past her eyes.

  She snatched, caught a wrist as slender as the blade. She wrested it from his grasp. Thrust herself up, graceless, whirling.

  Men fell back. She laughed. She slashed through the second circle.

  Hirel spat a curse. He was—almost—free.

  Blades flashed. Sevayin darted toward him.

  A knife’s edge lay across his throat. She halted, gasping. The blade eased a fraction. Its bearer smiled, approving her prudence. She hardly saw. She saw only the bead of blood swelling on Hirel’s neck.

  She turned slowly. No one touched her.

  Ziad-Ilarios had fallen from his seat onto his face. He lay unmoving. There was blood on his hands, pooling from beneath him.

  Aranos had regained his feet. He was amused no longer. “You have a man’s spirit,” he said, “still. Be sure of this, my lady: I will break it.”

  He approached her. The circles parted for him. He cradled his hand: perhaps she had broken it.

  He paused to regard his brother, coolly, without either hatred or pleasure; paused longer over his father. “I regret this,” he said. “He deserved a better death.”

  “Better? How better? In bed, of poison?”

  “In bed, in his palace, of the sickness that had all but taken him.”

  “Which, no doubt, he owed to you.”

  “No,” said Aranos. “I would never have slain him so slowly, or in so much pain.” He held out his unwounded hand. “Come.”

  He set power in the simple word; and compulsion; and unshakable will. She knew the shape and the taste of it. It came of the mystery and the sacrifice. And no god to make it splendid; to give back warmth where warmth was forsaken.

  Cold heart, cold purity. Cold self turned inward upon itself, forgetting joy, abandoning desire.

  She was light to him. Light and fire. He recoiled from her. He yearned toward her. He bent all his strength upon her.

  It crushed her down and down. Alone, sundered from her power’s center, she could not stand against him.

  He stretched out his hands. His power wrought chains to bind her. His fingers curved to close upon her arms; to claim her. He smiled, tasting the sweetness of his victory.

  She struck with steel. He recoiled. Too slow. The blade bit flesh: brow, temple, cheek. Blood sprang.

  The mage with the knife cried out, abandoning his prisoner. The weapon flew from his hand. Slow, slow. They were all crawling-slow. The blade keened past her neck, cleaving air where her throat had been.

  Aranos made no sound. He leaped, bearing her back and down.

  Her arm struck first, brutally. The knife fell from shocked and senseless fingers.

  His power took its edge from pain, its strength from blood. It closed jaws upon her mind.

  Beauty without will was beauty still: beauty without mind, without spirit, without resistance. “I will have you,” he said. “I will own you.”

  She raked nails across his bleeding face.

  He gasped, but he laughed. She had barely raised a welt: her nails were cut warrior-short, the better to wield dagger and sword.

  He raised a single jeweled claw and set it gently, gently, just below her eye. “Will you yield after I have blinded these lovely eyes? Or will you yield now, while you have all of your senses?”

  She closed teeth on his arm. Her power rallied, reared up.

  Shadow loomed behind him. She throttled despair.

  He stiffened: pain of body, pain of mind. Shock. Incredulity. He arched backward, tearing his arm from her teeth. She gagged on blood. He twisted, clawing.

  Ulan squalled in rage and pain and tossed his wounded head. He snapped; caught the slender throat; tore.

  Aranos’ eyes were wide, astonished. His hands closed uselessly on shadows. He fell broken, a fragile thing of bones and blood and tattered skin.

  And yet he smiled, as if it were a mighty jest: that he of all men living should die as a beast dies, and for this. An outland beauty; an outland fire.

  Hirel was there. Love that she could understand; desire without taint of corruption.

  He dragged her up, or she dragged herself. She had no strength to waste in caring which it was. Aranos’ servants were scattered: lost, wavering, waking to fear. Some already had fled. None of them tried to recapture their prey.

  Sevayin first, Hirel after, fell on Ulan. He was bleeding, but he was grimly content, as ever at a kill well made.

  He gave them strength. They linked hands over his back.

  Hirel’s grief struck her, wrought of fire, edged in royal ice. Not only for his father. For the one who, after all, had been his brother.

  It was a weapon. She sheathed it in her power. Grief, wrath—there was no time. Aranos had reft Mirain of all her strength; and through it the bond, the union of mages. They were all fallen, their power taken or held prisoner. He was alone, he and the two who shared his soul.

  He held. Battered, beaten, he held. Mages had fallen before him. Their power had gone to swell his own.

  But it was ebbing fast. They were too many and too strong; too ruthless. Neither hatred nor vengeance drove them. They were cold and steady, implacable, willing him to fall.

  Sevayin’s teeth bared. She hated with crystal purity.

  She raised her power through the burning glass that was her lover, and loosed it in the fire of her hand, joining it to Mirain’s. The pain was terrible; unbearable.

  She had borne greater in the fires of the change. She firmed her will with the memory.

  The mages wavered. Their blows fell awry. One toppled, keening: a youth in violet, seared by the Sun’s fire.

  Sevayin left Hirel half-lying on Ulan’s back, rapt in the perfection of power. She inched toward Mirain.

  The mages dared not strike her. Her child was too precious.

  They raised their power like a hand, closing on her wrist, forcing it down, driving her back. She let them quench the Kasar. She twisted round their hindrance and flung herself toward her father.

  The floor caught her; she cried out, short and sharp, more in surprise than in pain. But her hand gripped his. She drew herself to him, wrapped her arms about him, held fast.

  The silence was thunderous, in mind as in body. Sevayin lifted her head and met the guildmaster’s stare. “Now,” she said, “kill him.”

  “Let him g
o,” said the master.

  She set her body the more firmly between them. Mirain knelt motionless, his eyes closed. His branded hand lay curled on his thigh, trembling a very little. Its pain was the twin to hers.

  For a long while no one moved. One by one, Elian and Vadin stumbled to their feet. Hirel came dreamwalking toward them, clear-eyed within the dream, smiling, being power purely. They linked hands like children in a dance, and were still.

  “Sarevadin,” the guildmaster said, “you swore a vow. Have you forgotten it?”

  “I have sworn nothing,” she said.

  “You have,” he said. “In accepting the change. In shaping yourself for peace. Now you see that the balance cannot endure while he lives, nor can the war be ended. Will you honor the compact? Or will you be forsworn?”

  Her body was leaden heavy; Mirain had turned to stone in her arms. “I never agreed to watch you slaughter my father.”

  “We are sworn to peace. We cannot gain it while he lives.”

  “You will not—”

  Mirain’s hands closed on her wrists, prying her free, thrusting her back. His eyes tore her soul. “You have sworn,” he said. “Honor your oath.”

  She struggled uselessly. “I have not! They promised me. You would live.”

  “You gave yourself into their hands. You surrendered your manhood for peace. Their peace. Which is only assured if I am dead.”

  “You are all mad!” She broke his grip, wheeled. “I will have my peace. Two emperors on two thrones; myself wedded to Asanion’s heir; our son heir of the empires. No war. No killing. No constant, relentless, implacable resistance. Will you be sane or must I raise my power?”

  “It is too late for sanity,” the guildmaster said.

  “Far too late,” said Mirain, lifting his hand.

  The mages whirled to the attack. Daggers glittered; Hirel cried out.

  Blood fountained over his hands. Vadin sagged in them.

  Sevayin cried out in rage and despair. They had come for a clash of power, not a battle of bronze and grey iron.

  Only Ulan was glad. He roared and sprang. Mages fell. Blood stained the stones.

  She clutched at the rags of her magery. Hirel left Vadin lying and sprang to ward her with his body. He had his two swords, Olenyai weapons, lean and wicked as cats’ claws. She snatched one, won it from his startlement.

  No one would touch her. Ulan crouched at bay on the very edge of the fire. Mirain stood back to back with Elian, blades in their hands.

  Vadin was up. Bleeding, staggering, blessedly alive. Smiling at the mages, a bared-teeth smile. “So,” he said. “This is the honor of your guild. Sword-honor. Traitors’ honor.” He laughed and swept out his blades, sword and long wicked knife. “Look you! I can fight as foul as any mage.”

  He whirled still laughing, leaped, cut down the Zhil’ari witch. A mage, death-driven, sprang upon him.

  Elian’s knife caught the man in the air. He fell sprawling, clutching at her. She stumbled, swayed. He dragged her with him as he died.

  She struggled wildly in his deathgrip. Broke it. Surged up.

  She was forgotten. They were all forgotten. Knives closed in upon Mirain. Power sang in discord, pitched for his mind’s ears, dulling them, sapping his strength.

  Alone, he could not match them. There were too many. He crouched, eyes glittering, lips drawn back in a fierce panther-smile. He had always loved a battle.

  Elian caught a blade as it licked toward Mirain’s back, turned it, closed with its bearer.

  “No,” whispered Sevayin. She had dreamed it just so. The hall of stone, the figured walls, the fire. The guildmaster standing apart, dispassionate. The Asanian emperor sprawled before a wooden throne. Mirain beset, battling for his life. Vadin Uthanyas down once more, wounded unto death; and in his lord no strength to bring him back, no time to begin. Hirel flung out of the battle, wavering against the great grey cat, stunned in the shattering of power’s bonds.

  And first and last and most terrible, Elian Kalirien locked body to body with a black sorcerer, a man tall and strong and skilled, fierce in his hatred of all that she was.

  “No,” Sevayin said, louder. She shifted her grip on the swordhilt.

  It balanced well. She could not say the same for herself.

  The combatants twisted, twined. Elian’s hair had escaped its net; she whipped it across the mage’s face.

  He recoiled. Sevayin tensed to spring. A strong body thrust her aside, wrenched the blade from her hand.

  She stood gaping. She had seen Ziad-Ilarios fall. She had seen him die.

  He should be dead. His wound was mortal. He moved on will alone, and on something very like a seer’s certainty.

  He had come for this. He had lived for it. He sprang, blade shortened, stabbing.

  The mage bellowed, spun, slashed. Elian lunged for the hand, Ilarios for the heart.

  Their eyes met across the straining body of their enemy. They smiled the same swift smile. Bright, wild, daring death to touch them.

  The fine Asanian steel plunged through flesh and bone, drinking deep. The mage gasped, astonished; and toppled.

  Ziad-Ilarios sank down. His golden robe was scarlet. His life ebbed with the tide of his blood. His smile had died, his last sweet madness faded. But he was content. “She lives,” he said distinctly. “I have died in her place. I could not have died a better death.”

  Sevayin swayed. Her heart thudded. The child was too still, in a stabbing of small pains. She quelled them with stiffened hands and stiffened mind. She could not see her mother.

  Under the cloaked and lifeless bulk, a body stirred. Sevayin heaved the carrion away. Beginning to understand; crying out against the understanding.

  Elian lay on her back, pooled in blood. But the man had hardly bled: the blade was still in him. Sevayin dropped to her knees. Elian looked up at her and smiled. She was all scarlet.

  Her throat.

  Sevayin’s mind was very clear. For a timeless moment, she thanked all the gods that Ziad-Ilarios had died before he knew that he had failed. For even as the mage fell dying, he had remembered his weapon.

  Perhaps Elian had aided him: snatching at his hand, casting it awry as his weight bore her down, averting it from eyes or heart to the undefended throat. It had cut deep. Her life poured out of her, driven by her frantic heart. Sevayin could not stop it.

  Mirain was a greater healer than Sevayin would ever be. If she could only slow the torrent. If he could—

  A wolf was howling.

  It was Mirain. Battling to break free, trapped, hedged in bronze and in power. Going mad, beast-mad.

  “Father!” cried Sevayin. Her power lashed through the white agony of magewalls. Struck his, seized Hirel’s, sucked in the magegate itself.

  Blades flared molten and dropped. The gate could not endure the force of it. Not her power flaming through it, and the mages rising against her, and the magefire itself roaring to meet them. Its stones writhed in agony. They were not strong enough. They could not give as she demanded.

  For Mirain they would give it. She wielded them without mercy. They twisted in her grasp.

  One rose above them, separate, yet binding himself to them. Vadin, her mind whispered, protesting. He was dying. He could not. He must not.

  He fitted himself to her hand. He was strong in this his second death; he had no fear of it. He wielded her as she wielded him, to set his oathbrother free.

  The gate wavered. A little more, she begged it. Only a little. She fed the fires with her own substance.

  No. Vadin, clear in her mind. Will you kill your son? Back now; this fight is mine.

  She struggled. He had not her strength, even now, but he had learned his skill from Mirain himself. He eased her out and away, then poised, paused. He made himself a spear, and plunged full into the mages’ wall.

  It burst in a shower of fire. The spear burst with it, exulting.

  Mirain bestrode his lady’s body and cried aloud. The gate was gone. Vadin wa
s gone. Elian died even as Mirain bent to heal her.

  He who had raised the dead had no awe of death. Her soul eluded him; he pursued it. He was the Son of the Sun. He would not let her die.

  You must. Hers was no witless flitting soul, befuddled with its freedom. She barred the way, even to him who was half a god.

  Perhaps she grieved that she must do it. She was stern before him and all the silent helpless mages. The gods are not mocked. Go, Mirain An-Sh’Endor. Leave me to my peace.

  He fought the truth of it. All of death’s ways had closed against him, save only his own.

  He contemplated it. He yearned for it.

  But he was the Sunborn. He had been that before ever wife or brother came to share his soul. He was the high god’s son, the Sword of Avaryan, the lord of the eastern world. The lord of the west was dead. He had a world to claim.

  In the looming silence, he turned. No madness marred his face. He looked quiet and sane and worn to the bone.

  His hands opened and closed. No hilt came to fill them. Sevayin had destroyed them all.

  He sank to one knee. With utmost gentleness he lifted his empress, his brother. He cradled them. He murmured a word, two. Sevayin did not try to understand.

  Gently again he laid them down, straightening their limbs, smoothing their hair, closing their eyes. He kissed them both, brow, lips, lingering.

  He rose. Sevayin shivered. He was perfectly, terribly calm. He raised his hand.

  Twice nine mages remained. Most were wounded, but they had no fear of him. They had robbed him of the greater part of his soul.

  Limping, halting, they came together. They raised their shields and waited for the lightning to fall.

  PART FIVE

  Hirel Uverias

  TWENTY-FIVE

  The world was ending. Hirel was not uncomfortable, contemplating it. His neck stung where the knife had cut, but the bladesman was gone, felled or fled.

  No one else had touched him. He was the merest shadow of nothing: the Sunchild’s familiar. He had no power in himself; his steel they would not face. He could not make them face it.

  He had been angry, a moment or an age ago. It did not matter now. Nothing mattered but that his death was waiting. It was strangely beautiful. It had Uvarra’s face.